“Love one another.”
I was reading recently about the great scientist Albert Einstein.
Most people do not realize that he believed in God
and he went to church regularly.
One of his great quotes that I love is
when asked about belief in God, he said,
“The question seems to me is the universe friendly?”
Is the universe friendly.
And he says, “I believe it is.
And if it is then are we willing to be friendly back?”
One could spend days or even months pondering
the depth of that profession of faith
because it has so much richness to it.
The question of the universe being friendly
is the core creation of God.
And Jesus comes as the manifestation of God to remind us
that not only is the universe friendly but God loves us.
God loves us completely and truly.
And every single one of us is a complete and unique creation
never to be repeated again!
That God loves us by giving us life and sustaining us.
Yes. The universe is friendly
and we are called to be friendly back.
Now Jesus helps us with this by showing us how to do this;
and this is his reminder to his disciples that
“to love one another as I have loved you
and how my Father has loved me.
And that we remain in one another.”
It is the love that is the ultimate sustainer of all life.
And that God in Jesus shows us how to do that.
Now what exactly does he do?
Jesus does two things and he does them very well.
First of all, when he sees beauty and goodness,
he reflects back that beauty and goodness to them.
In that sense, he is like a mirror.
He reflects back the goodness of God
when he sees and experiences it.
When he sees beauty; when he sees goodness,
he calls it forth and will say blessed are you because of this.
That is one thing.
He acts like a mirror to goodness.
But to evil; to ugliness; to bitterness, anger, envy and jealousy;
to all those toxins he does not act like a mirror.
What he acts like is a water purifier.
He soaks it all in and gives back purity.
These two images help us to find out
who are we to be in this world;
a mirror to goodness and
a water purifier to all toxicity;
all ugliness, anger, hate and violence.
And even death.
Soak it in and give back goodness.
Today, we celebrate Mother’s Day and
there is no greater example of this in action
than a good mother doing her work well.
Just think of it for a moment:
A mother will always reflect back,
mirror back, the goodness of her child;
encourage it and make it flourish by reflecting back
“Oh you’re beautiful; you are wonderful; you have great gifts.
You are a creation of God,” the mirror.
But also, a good mother purifies.
When there is toxicity, jealousy, envy and sin,
they are also quick to say,
“Don’t you ever do that in public again.
Don’t you ever speak like that.
Don’t ever do that.”
There is this need to absorb it in and to give back purity.
A good mother does both of these very well
and it is what we honor today;
the discipleship of motherhood
and one does not even need to be a birth mother per se;
I have lots of mothers in my life,
who show these two things very well to me;
the mirror of beauty and goodness and
the water purifier of toxicity, violence, ugliness, and jealousy of life.
But it is not just females who are called to be mothers
in this sense or to be mirrors,
every disciple is called to be like that.
It is the command to love one another.
And one must do both.
It is not enough to love those who love us,
to mirror back; that part is important and good.
We need to do that but we also must love those
who are not capable of love;
those who are toxic, have bitterness, have jealousy, hatred,
violence and even death in their life;
that we absorb in those toxins and give back blessing;
give back forgiveness; give back gentleness, kindness;
give back forgiveness and ultimately give back love.
So today, we live this gospel and these first readings
the command to love one another
by being both a mirror and by being a water purifier.
Both are necessary.
And both are what mothers do well.
Be a mirror and a water purifier.
Love one another.
